Australia won the toss and decided to put runs on the board first . Their start wasn’t that good ,both the openers struggled to rotate the strike and the pressure mounted on them and as a result Healy took risk to hit over the infield but got caught by Nashra Sandhu on Baig’s ball in the 7th over. Captain Lanning came 1 down and she took her time in the beginning , on the other hand Bolton’s fight continued but she got caught and bowled by hands of Sana Mir in the 12th over . Next batswomen Ellyse Perry also find it difficult to handle the spin attack of Pakistan and her innings ended after 28 ball struggle in the 18th over. At this time Australia was on 54-3 , now the weight lies on both the Captain and her deputy Rachael Haynes and by this time Lanning already got herself familiar to the conditions , she hit 19 fours on her way to 124 runs off 106 balls . Both made huge 181 runs partnership for the 4th wicket in which Haynes came up with 79 in 82 balls ( 9 Fours and a Six ) , her innings ended when she tried to hit a six over long on in the 44th over and got caught by Munneba . Australia managed to reach 273 runs which proved more than enough for Pakistan. Nashra Sandhu took 3 wickets giving away 54 runs in her quota of 10 overs .
Megan Schutt strike early in the 6th over getting Ayesha Zafar out and then in the very next over Ellyse Perry bowled a beauty of delivery to get rid of Muneeba. Captain Javeria Khan disappointed once again ,Schutt bowled her on an in-swinging delivery. Opener Nahida Khan was still holding on one end of the wicket . Young Left arm spinner Sophie Molineux on the other hand got two wickets in her first spell and then two big fish in her last spell getting Sana Mir and Nahida Khan . Gardner also strike twice in the end and restricted Pakistan to 123 runs. Nahida was the highest scorer with 66 runs off 114 balls . Moreover 7 Pakistani batswomen scored in single digits . So Pakistan failed to resolve their batting issue and got punished in this 2nd ODI.
BRIEF SCORES:
Australia Women: 273/7 in 50.0 Overs { Meg Lanning 124 (106) , Rachael Haynes 79(82) ; Nashra Sandhu 54/3 }
Pakistan Women: 123/10 in 40.1 overs { Nahida Khan 66(114) ,Sana Mir 15(49) ; Sophie Molineux 14/4 }
Meg Lanning was adjudged Player of the Match . She made a century after July 2017 and first after her shoulder injury . She got the most hundred in Women ODI’s history just in 68 innings , Suzie Bates is second with 10 tons in her bag. Currently She is averaging more than 50 in ODI’s and no one will be surprised if she breaks all sorts of batting records in future.
The last ODI match will be played on the same ground on 22nd October and it will be interesting to see whether Pakistan will get some moments to cherish or not in this final encounter . Well a team effort will be needed to give the Aussies some fight.
